Category: e-publishing

How to find your 2012 earnings from CreateSpace, Kindle, Nook, Smashwords, and Bookbaby…

If you had Kindle, Nook, Smashwords, or BookBaby publish or sell your ebooks (or CreateSpace sell your paperbacks) in 2012, how can you find out how much you earned, how many books of each title you sold (and the total income for each), and in which countries your masterpieces sold? All of the firms send [...]

Thursday January 3rd, 2013 in 1 Shopping Cart, ancillary publishing, articles, Blurb, digital publishing, e-publishing, fiction, iPad, Kindle, Lightning Source, LSI, Lulu, niche publishing, Nook, novel writing, open publishing, product development, publishing, self-publishing, small publishers, Smashwords, webmarketing, writing | 2 Comments »

Five steps: how to pick your critical non-fiction book title

Five veteran publishers were talking during a break at an association meeting a few months back. I was included. The question: what was the dumbest thing we’d ever done with a book, or several? Five out of five: we’d given one of our books some cryptic, in-house, in-joke, or otherwise bewildering title. All with the [...]

Thursday December 20th, 2012 in 1 Shopping Cart, ancillary publishing, articles, Blurb, digital publishing, e-publishing, editing, iPad, Kindle, Lightning Source, LSI, Lulu, niche publishing, Nook, open publishing, pre-testing, publishing, self-publishing, Smashwords, webmarketing, writing | No Comments »

Publishers may need three URL’s per book…

When you publish a book, yours or some lucky author’s, the biggest problem is selling it. To do that you need the new book well displayed and promoted wherever the potential readers, or at least buyers, will be (1) attracted to it, (2) want to know more, and (3) will order it then or soon. [...]

Monday December 17th, 2012 in 1 Shopping Cart, articles, Blurb, digital publishing, e-publishing, empire building, iPad, Kindle, Lightning Source, LSI, Lulu, niche marketing, niche publishing, Nook, open publishing, publishing, self-publishing, small publishers, Smashwords, webmarketing | 1 Comment »

Never type out the title of your book. Here’s why…

A short blog about something I stumbled on last year that has saved me a ton of time writing in Word on my computer. This may be “new news” to 5% of you reading it, but I was in that 5% for a decade or more while I presume all of my friends knew the [...]

Friday December 7th, 2012 in articles, digital publishing, e-publishing, editing, niche marketing, niche publishing, novel writing, open publishing, publishing, self-publishing, travel writing, writing | No Comments »

Publishers have so much to be thankful for in 2012…

The day before Thanksgiving I sent the copy that follows to my monthly newsletterfolk. Let me overrule an in-house tradition of keeping the newsletter and blogs separate, this one time, since I’ve had a lot of positive response, I like the message, it deserves sharing, and the newsletter is free so it doesn’t really cost [...]

Tuesday December 4th, 2012 in ancillary publishing, articles, Blurb, digital publishing, e-publishing, fiction, iPad, Lightning Source, LSI, Lulu, niche publishing, Nook, open publishing, pre-testing, product development, publishing, self-publishing, small publishers, Smashwords, webmarketing | No Comments »

How selling your book before publishing it makes more cents

While it seems sort of illogical, strong cases can be made for offering a new book (or even an updated and revised edition) at a lower (or teaser) price before the main printing is completed, when you want a solid retail book price for the months or years to come. In this blog I’m discussing [...]

Wednesday November 28th, 2012 in ancillary publishing, articles, digital publishing, e-publishing, editing, empire building, niche marketing, niche publishing, pre-testing, product development, publishing, self-publishing, small publishers, speaking, writing | No Comments »

Getting our bound book out first, fast, and often as ebooks

In a blog here on November 15 I explained what a publisher, like us, expects from the author as his/her book is sent to press, and of course before. The book I discussed just saw light in paperback and digital (PDF) formats: Patrick Anderson’s The Kid in Purple Pants: Structured Approaches to Educating Underprivileged Students. [...]

Tuesday November 20th, 2012 in ancillary publishing, articles, Blurb, digital publishing, e-publishing, iPad, Kindle, Lightning Source, LSI, Lulu, niche publishing, Nook, open publishing, product development, publishing, self-publishing, small publishers, Smashwords, webmarketing | No Comments »

The publisher’s expectations from an author before printing

I’m the publisher in this case (though I’ve written seven books for other publishers), and the book discussed was printed a few days ago. It will reach the author (and a convention in Chicago where he will sign copies) in a few days. The author is Patrick Anderson, a genial, bright school superintendent in southwestern [...]

Thursday November 15th, 2012 in articles, digital publishing, e-publishing, niche publishing, publishing, small publishers | No Comments »

Creating Book Covers That Work…

It’s fun to look through a professional book designer’s eyes to share what works for them—and what doesn’t! Particularly if you’re a publisher having to buy such art and design. Joel Friedlander, a San Rafael designer, shared some of his Self-Publishing Roadmap program’s contents, at the Nov. 10 BAIPA (Bay Area Independent Publishers Association) meeting, [...]

Monday November 12th, 2012 in ancillary publishing, articles, digital publishing, e-publishing, Kindle, LSI, Lulu, niche publishing, Nook, product development, publishing, self-publishing, Smashwords, webmarketing | No Comments »

If you are publishing your book, when do you need the money?

Since I’m within a week of publishing Patrick Anderson’s The Kid in Purple Pants: Structural Approaches to Educating Underprivileged Students, let’s talk about niche books first, then the broader self-published books most likely sold to libraries, bookstores, and your family. I’ll also talk about open publishing too: Kindle, Nook, Smashwords, Lulu, and others… No money [...]

Friday October 12th, 2012 in ancillary publishing, articles, Blurb, digital publishing, e-publishing, empire building, fiction, iPad, Kindle, Lightning Source, LSI, Lulu, niche marketing, niche publishing, Nook, novel writing, open publishing, pre-testing, publishing, self-publishing, small publishers, Smashwords, webmarketing, writing | 2 Comments »